by Jo Davis
“Is that what you want? Rules? With me in charge, and not just because of the assignment?”
“I said before that I was willing to give it a try, didn’t I?”
A flare of excitement shot through his blood, quickly tempered. “I want you to be certain, baby. If you’re not fully committed in here,” he emphasized, tapping the side of her head, “it won’t work.”
“I’m willing to kick my preconceptions to the curb and give it a shot.” Her tone was sincere.
“It can’t be only for me, though. You have to want it for yourself.” As much as he wanted this, she had to understand the difference.
“I’m not doing this for you, but for me. For us,” she said earnestly. “I’ve learned a few things about myself lately—that my world isn’t as black and white as I always believed—and I think I owe it to myself to explore them. Will it work? I don’t know, but I’m ready to—”
Whatever she might’ve said was put on hold as three men walked into the lobby. All three were wearing suits, one in particular appearing more rumpled and stressed-out than the other two.
Michael. Fan-fucking-tastic. Blaze might be fired and hiring out as a mercenary before this day was over.
“Agent Kelly,” Ross said coolly as the three approached. “These gentlemen are from the FBI and have come to see about Agent Collins. They’ll stay with him until he’s well enough to be transferred to another facility.”
You’re not needed here was what he really meant.
Blaze turned his attention to the pair of dour-faced suits. “Good. I can’t thank Collins enough for rescuing Agent Foster,” he said, indicating her. “She’s a damned fine lady and a valued part of our team here. I hope he’s not in trouble for doing the right thing.”
One of them pursed his thin lips. “He might’ve been, but we’d already received communication from him forty-eight hours ago that he believed he was under suspicion. The director was getting ready to pull him out.”
The guy didn’t sound real happy about it. Like he’d wanted Collins to be in deep shit. Some assholes were like that. “Good to know. Well, it was nice to meet you, but I’m going to get this scratch doctored, and then I’m out of here.” He glanced at Ross. “Unless you want me to see you after?”
“No, it’s late. You and Foster go home and get some sleep. I’ll see you both in my office at three this afternoon.”
Not as much time as he’d hoped, but he was lucky to get that much. His boss was so pissed, there was no way anyone could miss the signals. “We’ll be there. Coming with me?” he asked Emma.
“Yes.”
They started toward the check-in desk together, but Ross caught him by the arm. “You’re not off the hook,” he said, low enough the two Feds couldn’t hear. “The reason we’re not meeting now is if we do, I’ll fire your ass, and I can’t afford to lose an agent of your caliber. You get me?”
“Yeah, I get you. But know this—given the choice, fired or not, I’d do the same thing again. Nobody stands between me and her, period. I’m sure you can get that.”
A few tense moments ticked by, but the explosion he half expected never came. He waited until Michael broke eye contact and turned away, joined the two Feds, and disappeared down the hallway before taking Emma’s hand and walking off.
He meant what he’d said. The day he didn’t go after Emma was the day they put him in the ground.
The pang of remorse Emma had felt at not being able to visit J.C. was eclipsed by the larger-than-life presence of the big man at her side. God, she’d missed him. Had come too close to never seeing him again.
And she’d hurt him. Oh, he’d acted tough, but he hadn’t been able to hide his feelings—at least, not quickly enough. Yet he’d done essentially the same thing—right? Was it different because she’d slept with a man, the opposite sex, and he’d been with someone of the same sex? Was that a double standard?
Maybe. But oddly enough, it didn’t bother her to know he’d been with another man. In fact, it kind of . . . turned her on. More than a little. Another woman? That would’ve hurt, as she’d no doubt done to him.
Miserable, she watched as the nurse finished cleaning his cut with antiseptic and gave him a shot. Since no stitches were needed, the nurse covered the cut with a bandage and declared him fit to leave.
Thanking the nurse, Blaze took Emma’s hand and led her from the hospital, downstairs and through the compound, and out to his car.
“Where are we going?”
“Home, to sleep.”
She peered at him in the predawn light just beginning to peek over the horizon. “Home?”
“My house,” he clarified. “I’m exhausted and you must be, too. I don’t have the energy to drive you to your house and then drive myself home, even if I was willing to do that, which I’m not.”
“Why not?”
“You’re safer with me, and that’s where you’ll stay. We’ll pick up some of your stuff tomorrow. Or later today, I mean. Shit, I’m so tired I don’t know what I mean.”
“So am I, which is probably why I’m not kicking your butt for ordering me around,” she grumped.
“No, you just know I’m right and won’t admit it. If you have a flaw, that’s the one.”
“Oh, really?” He unlocked the car. She slid in and frowned at him, annoyed. “What flaw?”
“Your damned pride. When I’m wrong, I admit it.”
“I won’t dignify that with a response.”
“You need time to come up with one, more like.”
“Whatever.”
His sexy laugh made her scowl, because she knew he was right. Her pride often got in the way, like now. “Okay, you’ve got a point,” she muttered.
“What? Can’t hear you.”
“I said you’re right, you jackass. I’m probably safer at your house until Dietz is caught. Satisfied?”
“For now.” He grinned at her. “Maybe by then you won’t want to leave.”
She stared at him, unsure how to answer. Fortunately, he turned his attention to the road again and fell silent, leaving her to gather her wits. She could easily envision them together, forever. Falling even more deeply in love with him than she already was, completely entwining their lives and their future.
Who knows how far they’d now be as a couple if things hadn’t gone so horribly wrong?
Emma recalled the last time she’d been here, months ago. The night of their terrible argument, when he’d come clean with her about his lifestyle as a D/s master. Handsome face excited, nervous, and full of hope, he’d said he had something he wanted to share with her, and he’d taken her downstairs.
To the BDSM dungeon in his basement. She’d been shocked, but now she knew her reaction had been knee-jerk and completely unfair to him. She’d shut him down without even giving him—them—a chance and had torn out his heart, and hers, in the process.
“What the hell is all of this?”
“It’s my playroom, Emma. I’m a Dom, and—”
“What? Like whips and chains? You beat on people, tie them up?”
“No! I mean yes, but it’s for both of our pleasure. You liked when I cuffed you and tied you up, remember? Total submission is the highest sexual peak a body can reach. I started as a sub myself and worked up to being a master, and I’d never do anything to you I haven’t personally experienced.”
“I—I don’t know. Why can’t we just be a normal couple?”
“Come on, baby. Give it a try and you won’t regret it. Do you really want your only flavor to be vanilla for the rest of your life? Seriously? I promise you I’ll show you a whole new world of pleasure you never knew existed.”
For a minute, she’d actually considered it.
“I can’t do this, Blaze. I don’t belong in your world, and you’d never be satisfied in mine.”
“It’s who I am. Please, baby, give me—us—a chance.”
“No, it’s not who you are! It’s just a perverted game, and if we meant that much, yo
u could walk away!”
“You’d ask that of me? To give up a part of my soul?”
“Hell, yes! You asked me to compromise mine!”
The devastation on his face just before she fled was a memory that still pierced her heart. She understood now why he’d taken refuge in his world at the club, why he’d drowned his sorrow the only way he knew how.
Looking back, she couldn’t blame him for being excited about sharing his dungeon with her. She had liked being tied up, although she’d run from that realization afterward. Had run from Blaze and his enthusiasm for teaching her his world.
“What are you doing?”
“Easy, darlin’. You trust me—right?”
Slowly, she nodded. Inside, she was jelly.
When he attached her wrists to each post on his bed with soft cuffs, she teetered on the edge of excitement and panic. To his credit, he worked slowly, making certain she was comfortable.
She lay on her back, pillow under her hips. When he parted her thighs and knelt between them, her heart pounded in her chest. She’d never been restrained in any way during sex and wasn’t sure she liked it. But his clever tongue soon made her forget the cuffs, blew to dust any thought except wanting more of him licking her pussy, feasting on her juices. He suckled and laved, driving her mindless until she writhed under the delicious assault, begging him to fuck her.
Rising to his knees, he lifted her, settling her legs over his shoulders. Then he pushed into her, so big, filling her completely. She cried out as he speared her again and again, working his cock in and out of her pussy like a piston. All too soon, her orgasm sent her flying into tiny pieces, and he followed, pumping her with cum.
“Good girl. You did well, Emma.”
She hesitated. The praise seemed strange, but she smiled. “Thanks. You weren’t so bad yourself.”
“You enjoyed that, didn’t you?”
“You know I did.”
His gaze was hopeful. “There’s more to experience, if you’re willing.”
“Like what?”
“Has anyone ever introduced you to rope play?” Her blank stare was all the answer he needed, and he smiled. “I want to try something new.”
She watched in equal parts trepidation and fascination as he pulled out and retrieved a long section of neon blue rope from a nearby chest. Bringing the rope back to the bed, he set it on the covers and released her wrists from the cuffs. However, instead of allowing her to put her arms down, he crossed her wrists. “Keep them like this.”
“What are you doing?” Her belly fluttered in anxiety.
“Patience. You’ll see.”
His tone seemed to discourage more questions, so she clamped her lips together as he worked. Looping the nylon around her wrists, he bound them together and began to weave the long ends in a crisscross pattern that intersected over her sternum and caused her breasts to jut forth in a way that made her feel sort of uncomfortable—and deliciously slutty.
He continued the pattern over her torso and around the small of her back, and then raised her knees, wrapping the brightly colored rope around her thighs and between her buttocks, parting her ass cheeks. When he tied off the ends, she was left unbelievably exposed, face flaming.
“I d-don’t know if I like this,” she protested weakly.
“Oh, baby, I think you do. And I think you want to find out what’s going to happen next.”
“I . . . Okay.”
“Good girl. God, you’re a natural.”
A natural at what, she didn’t have the presence of mind to ask. Especially when he retrieved a shiny, oblong silver object shaped like a huge bullet and rubbed it against her vulnerable sex. If the thing was a dildo, it wasn’t like any she’d ever read about or seen in pictures. He thumbed a switch, and the device delivered a tiny pulse, almost like the static shock one would receive after walking across the carpet and touching a metal surface. She gasped and bucked her hips.
“Easy, baby. I know that was a surprise, but did it really hurt?”
“No,” she admitted, nervous.
Thus began a delicious session of torture, her lover rubbing the device all over her vulva and clit. She writhed as it vibrated and sent little shocks rocketing through her belly to her fingers and toes. She moaned, but he was relentless, giving her no reprieve. And she didn’t want any, just wanted him to keep up the strange and wonderful torment.
A ball of energy gathered in her sex, helpless against the onslaught. When he plunged the instrument into her channel and fucked her with it in brisk strokes, making sure it brushed against her sensitive nub, her orgasm exploded, stronger than before.
“Oh, shit! Don’t stop!”
He chuckled, pumping the damned thing until she was limp, muscles twitching from the excess of stimulation.
“Are you all right, sweet Emma?”
“I don’t know. Ask me when my brain isn’t mush.”
“Do you understand what just happened?”
He seemed so serious, it made her nervous again, and she couldn’t help but try and make light of her response to his kink. “I was there, honey. I think I know what an orgasm is.”
“What happened was more than sex.” He paused, staring into her eyes. “Why did you allow me to cuff you, then bind you? To use the electric vibrator on you? The answer is important.”
She frowned, unsure what he was getting at. “What do you mean, why? I guess I was in the mood to be adventurous, that’s all.”
“No, it’s much more than that. I think you’re a submissive, baby.”
She blinked at him. “What?”
Excitement lit his golden eyes as he removed the bindings. “Will you come with me? There’s something I want to show you.”
If only she’d known what would happen. But would it have changed anything?
“We’re here, baby. Penny for your thoughts?”
“Just drifting. I needed to close my eyes.” She hadn’t realized they’d arrived at his house.
After the garage door went up, he drove in and killed the ignition. “Me, too. Shower first? I’ve got to get the stink of that guard’s blood off my skin.”
“Hot shower with an even hotter man? Sounds good.”
That earned her a lazy, sexy smile. Spirits bolstered, she accompanied him inside, through the kitchen and living room, and down the hallway to his bedroom. He tossed his keys and wallet onto the dresser and immediately began shucking his clothes, not the least bit shy about his body. Of course, a Dom wouldn’t be inhibited. That thought, coupled with the sight of taut, tanned skin rippling with muscles, nearly had her panting.
“You joining me?”
“Are you kidding? I’m not letting you hog all the hot water!”
Chuckling, he padded over to the nightstand and fished a condom out of the drawer. “Boy Scout,” he said, leering as she stripped. “Be prepared and all that.”
“Hmm. I thought you said you were tired.” Presenting him with her backside, she wiggled her bottom to tease him.
“Tired, not dead, honey. Big difference.”
In the bathroom, he placed the foil square on the soap dish and turned on the spray, testing it with his hand until he deemed it perfect, and opened the glass stall door. “After you.”
She stepped into the spray with a happy sigh. “Oh God, that feels heavenly.”
“I’ve got something that might feel even better.”
The front of his big wet body pressed against her back, his hard, thick cock riding her ass. His arms went around her, lips nuzzled her face, her neck. She relaxed into him, every bit of the past few days’ worth of tension draining through her feet.
“I was frantic to get to you,” he whispered. “You have no idea how maddening it was not to know what had happened to you, how helpless I felt. I was nearly sick with it, baby.”
“That’s how I felt not knowing for sure if I’d be able to return to you.”
“Are you really all right?” he whispered, squeezing her.
&nb
sp; “I am, I promise.”
“Stay like this.”
He broke contact, leaving her for a minute. She heard a squirting sound and heard him quickly wash up. Then his hands returned, soaping her shoulders and back. His palms slowly worked around, kneading muscles she hadn’t even realized were sore, and she groaned in pleasure. He soaped her buttocks and dipped briefly between her legs, the touch far too brief. She widened her stance, but he laughed, the noise a happy rumble in his chest.
“Patience, darlin’.”
Next he lathered her breasts, taking great care with her nipples, which were not the least bit dirty but loving the attention. Then south. Down her tummy, fingers brushing her bush. But they ventured no further, despite her whined protest.
“You’re so mean.”
“I’m taking care of my woman,” he corrected, voice sultry. “Making her want, keeping her on edge like any good Dom would do.”
“Is that so?” she breathed as those marvelous hands skimmed her rear.
“Yes. Brace your palms on the tile and spread your legs.”
She did, eager to find out what he’d do next. He stepped aside and let the spray rinse her free of the soap, used a sponge to get her front. Sweet kisses dotted the curve of her shoulder and neck as his fingers slid between her legs, rubbed her slit. His warm breath fanned against her ear, low and seductive.
“Tell me, beautiful girl. Did your G-man touch your pussy like this?”
“Blaze.” Oh, no. She couldn’t play this game. He was going to burn her alive.
“The truth.” He parted her pussy lips, working a finger into her channel.
“Y-yes, once.”
“How many times did he fuck you, pretty Emma? Just the once?”
“Three,” she admitted. “Please ...”
“Please, what?” His finger slipped from her channel, teased her clit in luxurious circles, driving her mad. “Please stop tormenting you? Does it make you uncomfortable to talk about him with me? That’s too bad. You can tell me what I want to know, and you will. How did he fuck you, Emma?”
“F-from behind, bent over a sofa.” She moaned as he increased the friction on her clit. “It was at a sex party Dietz held and he expected me to join in.”
